


you matter to me

by shonisclexa



Category: The Wilds (TV 2020)
Genre: F/F, Homophobia, Internalized Homophobia
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-07
Updated: 2021-02-08
Packaged: 2021-03-12 22:54:58
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,880
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29268321
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shonisclexa/pseuds/shonisclexa
Summary: shelby and toni get paired together to work on a history assignment. toni hates shelby and wants to move on with her life, but shelby feels otherwise.-basically how two gays have to do a project and one hates the other and one is in love with the other.
Relationships: Fatin Jadmani/Leah Rilke, Shelby Goodkind/Toni Shalifoe
Comments: 7
Kudos: 122





	1. Chapter 1

“And lastly, Toni Shalifoe and Shelby Goodkind.” 

Toni audibly groaned, slouching back in her chair and crossing her arms over her chest in annoyance. 

The teacher’s eyes snapped over to Toni and sent a harsh glare her way. “Toni if you have a problem please speak to me after class.”

See Toni wouldn’t have had a problem working with fucking Shelby Goodkind if this stupid project had been assigned a month ago.

Because a month ago Toni didn’t know about Shelby’s homophobic, bible kisser, holy water drinker nature. 

Toni, up until a month ago, had simply put up with Shelby. The girl had moved to Toni’s town at the start of this year, their junior year, and she didn’t bother Toni much. Sure she was always sucking face with her Andrew, her boyfriend, but what the fuck was she supposed to do about that. Andrew was a complete and utter asshole to Toni but maybe deep deep down he had a sliver of humanity for Shelby.

Nah that sounded like bullshit. 

But aside from her dickhead boyfriend, Shelby honestly didn’t bother Toni. But when she caught her yelling at some girl in the hallway for ‘pushing her homosexuality onto everyone’ or some shit along those lines, Toni snapped. 

So now the basketball player sat angrily at the back of her history class, as far away from Shelby as possible, wishing that it was acceptable to punch teachers, because she’d love to give Mr. I-Pair-You-With-Everyone-You-Hate a taste of his fucking medicine.

Toni jumped a little when the bell rung, she was lost in her own thoughts and the loud noise scared her a bit.

She didn’t make any attempt to move until the classroom was almost empty, except for Shelby who was searching frantically for something in her bag.

Toni walked up to her teacher’s desk, hands gripping the straps on her backpack and moving her feet up and down nervously. This would be the fourth time she was asking to switch partners and she wasn’t sure if she could get away with it this time.

Her teacher didn’t even glance at her, busily typing away at some email on his computer. When Toni cleared her throat to get his attention he let out a slight sigh and looked her way. “Yes, Toni?”

Toni nodded her head in Shelby’s direction as she replied. “So, can I switch partners or work alone, I don’t care which. I just can’t work with her.”

“No Toni, you’re working with her.”

Toni’s hands clenched her backpack straps harder, knuckles already turning white. “Why? I’ve never had to work with people I didn’t want to before.”

Letting out a heavy sigh, her teacher took off his glasses and rubbed his face in his hands. “Toni, listen. I’ve let you get away with switching partners because I know you had a history with those other people. But as far as I know you and Shelby have never engaged in a physical fight and you seem to ignore each other during class so I’m assuming you don’t fight verbally on the daily. You’re working with her, end of story.”

Toni angrily grabbed the teacher’s desk now. “No, Mr. Smith, not end of story. I don’t want to work with her, I don’t like her.”

Toni’s voice had raised a little and Shelby looked over at her from the corner of her eye, the blonde now zipping up her bag and preparing to leave. 

Mr. Smith put his glasses back on and went back to his email, wanting to close this argument before it begun. “Tell you what Toni, if you can get through this assignment with Shelby, with little to no bumps in the road, you can work with whoever you want for the rest of the year.”

That grabbed the brunette’s attention, her hands leaving his desk and returning to fiddle with her backpack. “Really? Like for the whole year?”

“Yes for the whole year.”

It was about mid-November and Toni was shocked, that was the best offer anyone had given her. “Okay. I’m game.”

“Great I’m glad you’re ‘game.’ Have a good rest of your day Toni, I’ll see you on Monday. And please start the project ahead of time, you have until the end of December to finish but it’s a big project.”

Toni shot him a small nod, showing that she heard him but wasn’t going to verbally confirm that she’d actually do it. 

As she was walking out into the hallway, most of it empty now as kids rushed to the buses to get home, she felt a bump on her shoulder.

Toni’s head quickly snapped to the side, preparing to get into a conflict with someone. But when her eye’s met Shelby, she calmed down a little, but not a lot as she still wasn’t fond of the girl. 

When the blonde caught Toni’s fiery gaze, she moved away from the brunette a bit. She matched Toni’s pace as they walked down the hallway and towards the parking lot, neither speaking or looking at each other.

As Toni pushed open the doors and almost made a run for it, Shelby spoke up, wanting to have a quick chat with the other girl. “Hey, uh, Toni?”

“What Shelby?”

The girl’s harsh tone took Shelby by surprise and she moved away even more. “I just, I just wanted to ask if you had a plan for this project. I know it’s going to take a while and I just, I wanted to get a head start.”

Toni rolled her eyes, Shelby was a planning freak, of course. Toni wasn’t the most organized person and tended to forget a lot of stuff and she could already tell that would work the blonde’s last nerve. “Nope I actually have no idea. If I’m being honest I blocked out what the assignment was even about when he was explaining it.”

Shelby furrowed her brows in annoyance but all she did in retaliation was shove her phone into Toni’s hands. “Well can you put your number in than. I want to get this over and done as quickly as possible.”

Toni scoffed in frustration, but still typed her number in Shelby’s phone. She then quickly handed the other girl her phone back, almost like holding Shelby’s phone was burning Toni’s hand. 

Toni turned, not saying another word to Shelby and started her three mile trek home.

Shelby stood and watched as Toni left, not sure what to do. “If you need a lift home I can drive you.”

Toni heard Shelby call after her but chose to ignore it, until Shelby’s car pulled up next to Toni in her fucking Mercedes. The blonde rolled down her window and repeated her offer again. “I can take you home if you want, it’s chilly out.”

Without even looking at her, Toni answered, still walking away from the other girl. “I’d rather get hypothermia and freeze to death out here than take a ride with you. No offense of course but, I wouldn’t be caught dead in that car.”

Shelby looked hurt at first, but the girl quickly masked it with an angry glare. “Fine. I’ll text you later.”

As Shelby sped up and away from Toni, the brunette mumbled under her breathe. “I can not fucking believe I have to put up with this bullshit. What the fuck did I do to deserve this.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> short chapter lol  
> mention of blood !!!

Right eight steps. Left seven. Right eight steps. Left seven. Right eight steps. Left seven.

Shelby was practically pacing holes in her floor as she waited for a response from Toni. 

She didn’t know why she was so nervous, the other girl seemed to hate Shelby’s entire being so she wasn’t quite sure why she was so drawn to the brunette.

Everytime Shelby did a little pace around the room, she’d end up just the littlest bit closer to the mirror. And God, she hated that mirror.

The only thing associated with that mirror were bad memories. Failed pageants, family arguments, judgement, self hatred, Becca...

Before Shelby started to spiral down a path of dark thoughts, her phone dinged, signaling that Toni had replied, even though it was an hour and twenty six minutes later.

Shelby [ 7:30 ]: hey, this is shelby :)

Toni [ 8:56 ]: hi. what do u want? 

Shelby flinched. She could feel the resentment Toni had towards her through the damn phone. Shelby just wished she knew why the basketball star was so mad at her, as far as she knew she hadn’t done anything to upset her. 

Shelby [ 8:57 ]: thanks for replying, thought you died for a second. i wanted to get a jump start on our project.

Toni [ 8:59 ]: yeah sorry for the late reply i was just busy with shit. can we resume this tmr.

Shelby [ 8:59 ]: what? can we just just establish a base real quick?

Toni [ 9:00 ]: i gtg shelby. ill text you tmr or smthin and we can meet up to work on the project. just not at my place.

Shelby [ 9:01 ]: ??? i guess? not at my house either. 

Shelby stared at her phone, confused. She really thought Toni wanted to be done and over with her, so naturally the blonde assumed Toni would want a jump start on the project. 

But apparently she had proved Shelby wrong. Shelby clicked her phone off in annoyance, upset that they couldn’t start yet.

For this project they needed to go out and about and find things that have a special part in their own personal history. 

Shelby really didn’t understand the purpose. It’s not like anything she and Toni did would be framed and placed in photo albums, it was just a dumb filler assignment. And at the moment Shelby wished she could be doing this with anybody else. 

-

As Toni marched angrily over to the park bench Shelby was seated at, she wracked her brain for excuses about yesterday’s situation.

She couldn’t tell they blonde ‘hey I couldn’t start last night because I forgot my wallet at my friend’s house and had to walk three miles there and three miles back. Oh yeah and then I had to a shit ton of homework that I have to do because I didn’t have time from working all week.’ 

Toni couldn’t just tell Shelby that because she just knew Shelby would look at her like she was some weak and pathetic human.

She didn’t want Shelby’s pity.

Toni sighed as she stood in front of the Texan, her arms shoveled into the pockets of her puffy brown jacket, shoulders slouched upwards to try and keep her neck and ears warm.

Shelby’s face softened at the action, though Toni didn’t understand why. The blonde then pointed towards the parking lot Toni just emerged from. “Cold? We can always go sit in my car if you’d like.”

Toni debated it. On one hand she was three seconds away from getting frostbite and should probably warm up, but on the other her ego was too big to want take up Shelby’s offer.

Toni shook her head. “Nah I’m good. Want to like, sit over at those benches or something and start this shit?”

Shelby looked over to the benches in question. There were a couple other people sitting at them, and Shelby really didn’t want distractions. “No there’s too many people there now. If you’d gotten here on time we probably good have.”

Toni rolled her eyes. Of course she’d be pissed at Toni for being late. But Toni did have a reason, it’s not like Toni had a ride so she had to hike the five mile walk to the park herself. 

Toni let out a breath and looked at the trees surrounding them, the last leaves tumbling off the branches. “What are you gonna lecture me about being late? Cause if so then I’d rather just walk home and fail this fucking assignment.”

Then it was Shelby’s turn to let out a sigh of annoyance, pushing past Toni and walking back towards the parking lot.

Toni watched her stalk away for a few seconds before following. “Hey where are you going?”

Without turning around, Shelby replied. “To my car. We need to go somewhere with heat, the park was a bad idea.”

Now Toni was annoyed, she did not walk all the way to this fucking park just for Shelby to change her mind. “And did you ever ask my thoughts on this? Maybe I want to work in the park.”

“No you don’t I can tell. Plus you’d be a popsicle before we even started.”

“Okay, but what if I don’t want to get in the car with you. Ever think of that? Because I really don’t.”

By now they were at Shelby’s car, where the blonde was fumbling around in her purse trying to find her keys. “Then you can walk.”

Toni glared at Shelby, infuriated that she’d just said that. The blonde had no context on how much walking Toni did so the comment wasn’t her fault, but it enraged Toni nonetheless. “You know what, no. I’m not going anywhere with you. I cant believe I actually accepted Mr. Smith’s stupid fucking idea. I cant work with you.”

Shelby spun around, her keys clenched tightly in her hands and anger bubbling in her eyes. “What the hell is your problem? What did I ever do to you?”

Toni raised her eyebrow, surprised that she was able to get under the blonde’s skin so quickly. “Date that asshole of a boyfriend of yours, and justify all his shitty actions.”

Shelby huffed angrily. “That is not a valid reason.”

“Oh I beg to differ. When someone’s being a homophobic piece of shit, I think I have the right to be pissed at him and people that associate with him.”

Shelby now had her arms crossed and her eyes squeezed shut, the rage radiating off her body. “He is not a homophobe. Don’t throw that word around. Now can we please go.”

Toni took a few steps back, needing space so she wouldn’t do something stupid. “I’m not throwing the word around when it’s fucking true! Are you in denial or just dumb because it has to be one of the two if you can’t fucking understand that what you’re boyfriend does is wrong!” 

Shelby countered Toni’s actions, the Texan taking a few steps towards the other girl. “What’s he ever done that’s so wrong?”

Toni clenched her fists together and took a deep breath in, she couldn’t start something that she’d regret. “Besides calling me slurs and starting fights with me for no reason, he also sleeps around with everyone in the fucking school. Not to mention the car he smashed, my car by the way, it was a gift from my coach. Also harassing my girlfriend- my ex-girlfriend on the daily. Always mocking her and shit for no reason at all. Do you need more reasons? Because the list can still fucking go on.”

Toni had never seen Shelby so infuriated. The blonde trudged back over to her car and flung open the door, slamming it shut as she started racing away.

Once the car was safely out of sight, Toni kicked a rock lying beside her, all her pent up aggression being released on this piece of stone. When it didn’t move and seemed unphased by her action, she kicked it again with even more anger than before. 

When nothing happened again, she kicked it once more, she didn’t really know what why, but she did. It was a large rock and she instantly regretted it as she felt pain spike up her leg.

“Fuck! Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.”

Toni knew she probably broke her toe. Or her foot. Just from the excruciating amount of pain she was feeling and the throbbing happening up and down her leg, she knew she fucked it up pretty bad.

But she didn’t care. She started hobbling back home, limping and wincing in pain as she made her way down the parking lot.

After walking a mere ten feet Toni had to stop, panting and sweating, her foot now really really killing her.

She stumbled onto the ground, practically falling, and began shakily unlacing her beat up old vans.

As she flung her shoe off she saw some blood seeping through her sock and that was enough information for Toni to know she did not want to see what her foot looked like.

As much as she didn’t want to, Toni picked up her phone and called Shelby’s number, as the girl was probably still in the area and would hopefully come back for Toni.

After a couple rings she heard and annoyed, and possibly crying Shelby. “Toni what the hell do you want-“

Toni’s voice cracked as she spoke. “Can you come back and take me home. Please. I cant, I cant walk.”

Shelby’s phone clattered on the other ending, sounding like the girl came to a quick stop. “Toni? What? Are you okay? Where are you?”

The phone slipped from Toni’s hand as her consciousness began to fade away.

As Toni’s head hit the floor, the last things she heard were Shelby screaming at her to stay awake and stay put, but the attempts didn’t work.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry for a short chapter! the next one will be longer hopefully! ty for reading feel free to drop a comment <3.

**Author's Note:**

> hi thanks for reading! feel free to drop some suggestions if youd like in the comments :).


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